ABSTRACT
This chapter explores how the specter of suicide shapes the intersubjective field between an analyst and her analysand who is fixated on death. Haunted by her own depression and the ghosts of friends who have suicided, the patient struggles to stay alive. Her despair stirs feelings of helplessness and urgency, forcing the analytic couple to relive the suffering of their respective childhoods. By using the framework of Intersubjective Self Psychology, the analyst works through the activation of her own painful history (the trailing edge) so that she can stand in the leading edge and hold out a new relational experience.
